Person of Interest Named In D.C. Suburban Killings

Person of Interest Named In D.C. Suburban Killings

New video has surfaced of the bearded, eccentric named as a person of interest in the killings of tree prominent citizens outside Washington D.C.

Fifty-three-year-old Charles Severance shuffled into a West Virginia courtroom with his shackles clinking.

Authorities say Severance might be linked to the chilling triple slaying in Alexandria, Virginia. He has not been charged, but is being held on an outstanding gun possession case.

Severance's mugshot is strikingly similar to the sketch of the wanted serial killer. Same facial features. Same bushy beard.

A prosecutor in West Virginia said, "He's a suspect in three homicides in Virginia. It appears that he left Virginia after being notified that the authorities wanted to talk to him."

Details are now emerging of Severance's colorful past. He twice ran for mayor of Alexandria on an anti-child-psychiatry platform. And earlier this month, he was questioned by the Secret Service after seeking asylum at the Russian embassy in D.C. where he was photographed wearing a bizarre outfit consisting of a poncho and hat that resembled something out of the Revolutionary War.

Severance runs a website which he called "The online authority on Mental Disorder." Photos from that site show him in college in the '80s. He has a degree in mechanical engineering. A more recent picture shows him at work on another of his interests, inventing card games.

The three Alexandria murder victims were all apparently killed by the same weapon. The most recent victim was music teacher, Ruthanne Lodato. She was gunned down in the doorway of her home last month. Transportation planner Ron Kirby was shot in his home in last November. And Nancy Dunning, the wife of the local sheriff, was murdered as she answered her door in 2003.